The Muslim brotherhood in Egypt is mobilizing its grassroots campaigners to garner support for the upcoming legislative elections to be held in October. This would be the first election after Mohammed Al Baradei return to Egypt and his calls for political reform. And after President Hosni’s Mubarack clear signs of an ailing health. The Group is counting on the upcoming election to win more seats in the legislative body. National observers are marking these elections with high importance, and they are seen as a test for the current regime and its ability to answer calls for reform to pave the way for post Hosni Muburack thirty years reign.

Also notable is a newly introduced bill in the senate that calls for greater political freedom in Egypt, The abolishment of the Marshal Law enacted in 1979, and easing of the government’s stringent rules on foreign aid. The bill is titled “support for democracy, human rights and civil liberties in Egypt”

We have seen similar bills under republican administrations, but never under a democrat. This could well mean the beginning of the end of Muburack’s era and the beginning of a new one, of which, we can predict little of.

Turkish militant Muslim groups are using gorilla methods to intimidate their enemies, namely the U.S. and Israel and even the Armenian minority that has been long persecuted by the Turkish Government.

Earlier this week Turkish Hackers stole addresses of 100,000 Israelis according to reports. The information stolen included email addresses of the victims as well as email addresses and passwords of close to 30,000 Pizza Hut customers were stolen. Luckily, credit card data was never stored on the Pizza hut website so the victim’s will not suffer financial loss as a result. However, in a separate incident earlier this month Turkish Hackers did end up stealing bank accounts and credit card information of Israelis.

In January, Turkish Hackers from the group called  ”mOsted” have also hacked two U.S. Army websites. The group is reportedly Anti-American and Anti-Israel. The websites hacked included, Army’s McAlester Ammunition Plant in McAlester, Okla., and at the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Transatlantic Center in Winchester, Va.. Both websites were replaced with a website full of Anti-American rhetoric.

In addition in April Turkish Hackers attacked several Armenian websites as a statement against Armenian Genocide day, which is observed on April 24. In 1915 the Turkish empire murdered more than one million Armenians. The Turkish government denies the genocide took place.

President Obama recently signed a tough Iranian sanctions bill into law. The sanctions will mostly target Iran’s energy sector. Even though Iran is an oil producing country it obtains a good portions of its energy needs from abroad, including companies from the EU and the U.S. The new sanctions bill targets gasoline exports to Iran as well as companies that do business with Iran’s revolutionary guard. The sanctions bill was also able to effectively close loopholes in the UN resolution that allowed  some U.S. companies to nevertheless supply Iran’s energy needs.

China has been concerned with the U.S. sanctions in line with its call for talks with Iran rather than other action. China is afraid that the new U.S. sanctions will stop Chinese companies from doing business in the U.S. as they have significant dealings with Iran.

The E.U. has also enacted more stringent sanctions than have been called for in the U.N. resolution. A number of European companies have already cancelled contracts and deliveries as a result.

In addition, Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president has been recently qouted as saying that Iran can be energy independent as soon as “next week”, most analysts say that energy independence for Iran is at least two years away. The new developments on this front beg the question of whether these sanctions come too late or whether they can still deal the significant blow that policy makers hope will stop Iran from going nuclear.

Dear FPA Family, I am happy to announce my return to DC. I shall resume my weekly blogs soon.

P.S: Thank you Derek Catsam for bringing the World Cup to us.

Friday June 11, 2010 Turkey along with Brazil voted “No” to further sanctions on Iran. This decision illustrated Turkey’s precarious situation in the Middle East. Turkey has applied to join the EU and is now a member of NATO, long hailed to be one of the only Muslim countries with a democracy and a western outlook.

On the other hand Turkey has been strengthening ties with Iran. Turkey imports a significant portion of its natural gas from Iran and a Turkish company helped build the airport in Teheran. Turkey’s philosophy has changed, Turkey wants to play a significant role in regional relations. In order for that to occur it needs to develop its credibility with nations such as Syria and Iran. One way to accomplish that is to show “backbone” at the U.N. In essence Turkey was aware that its vote would not prevent the sanctions resolution from passing but a “No” vote would signal to its earstwhile Arab friends that Turkey has not forgotten about them.

Playing both sides could be a dangerous game.  Turkey’s candidacy for the European Union is already in question, mostly because her royalties are unclear. In addition, Turkey shares a border with the Iranians, if the Iranians officially obtain the bomb, the potential fall out could be very detrimental to Turkey. Iran could use its weapons for bullying Turkey into accepting unreasonable economic demands from Iran.

A handful of Jordanian and Yemeni social workers teamed up this past week to learn supportive techniques for helping people recover from trauma. In Yemen, the trauma(s) that made this training necessary are domestic - Yemen has been embroiled in a civil war of sorts in Saada for the past six years or so. Jordan, fortunately, has not experienced the same internal conflict … but it has a history of absorbing those who have experienced it elsewhere. Governmental sponsorship of this initiative falls squarely in the category of foreign policy.

Joost Hiltermann (of the International Crisis Group) has a blog post at the New York Review of Books on the current climate in Iraq. The Supreme Court has certified the election results, but the country remains without a government, and it’s goal of having one by Ramadan (early August) or the planned withdrawal date of American troops (August 31) seems increasingly unrealistic. Hiltermann notes the widespread skepticism that characterizes Iraqis’ views on the political process, as well as outlining the tricky inter-relationships between parties.

At Niqash, where one can read news on Iraq in Arabic, English, and Kurdish, there are articles that underline both of these elements. First, an interview with Ameer al-Kinani, MP under the Sadrist umbrella, demonstrates just how tense relations between different political groups have become. You can see in this article how al-Kinani sort of switches off from emphatically invoking God’s approval of his party’s agenda and cagily leaving open alliances with essentially anyone but Maliki.

Another article, by Maria Fantappie, aggregates testimony from Iraqis on the influence of this kind of fear and uncertainty in their day-to day lives. She quotes an Iraqi source, “Saad”, in his explanation of the way Iraqis have learned to behave:

“Do you know the history of the monkeys in the cage?“ says Saad, who moved from Baghdad to live in Erbil few years ago.

“The story of monkeys explains why Iraqis, until today, have difficulties to overcome their fears after twenty-five years of oppression.” concludes Saad.

One has to wonder how this inheritance of fear translates into politicians’ strategizing. One also has to wonder how widely an explanation like Saad’s - founded on an unflattering comparison between Iraqis and monkeys - would be accepted within the country. Regardless, together these three pieces indicate that an end to political drama in Iraq is nowhere in sight.

Hello all,

I’m resuming blogging here at the FPA Middle East blog, after finishing my MA this May. I’m now in Damascus for the next several months, and will be commenting on the news from here.

It’s good to be back! Please get in touch (via the information in the Bio section) if you hear of any discussion-worthy articles or other publications.

The United States has renewed sanctions against Syria after considering sending an ambassador to Damascus and taking steps to normalize relations. The reasons cited for this move is Syrian intransigence in her ties with Iran, her snub of the recent Arab summits on international security, and the sale of SCUD missiles to Hezbollah. Please read more here.

The White House is hosting a summit on Global entrepreneurship in Washington D.C. next week. In a conference call earlier today, white house spokes people stated that the initiative is a result of certain promises made during the President’s Cairo speech. The conference will focus on areas of education, science and technology, economic opportunities, health and social media entrepreneurship. The White House sees this initiative as a first step in the larger process of having America more involved as a positive catalyst for change throughout the world. The administration also hopes that this initiative will spark a bevy of activity with NGO’s and multinational organizations to encourage cooperation.

Even though the spokesman for the White House insisted that the summit is more  of a global initiative, he did emphasize in a different part of his overview, that Muslim Majority countries are especially encouraged to share their views and attend.

The summit is an admirable idea, and hopefully will spark more cooperation between the U.S. and the rest of the world in terms of sharing ideas, technology and trade, which will help America stay competitive in the global market place. One interesting development would be,( if Israeli businessmen or scientists were in fact invited, which wasn’t altogether clear from the description) more regional cooperation in the Middle East. There are many mutual interests, between the people of the middle east  that can be addressed during such a forum without interruption from government officials. I suspect some of the key points of mutual agreement and concern would be innovative business models, which would  be beneficial to the region (including Israel), as well as mutual problems such as lack of clean water and rich soil and scientific solutions that would encourage water and land conservation.